The author is a Forbes contributor. The opinions expressed are those of the writer.

Loading ...

Loading ...

This story appears in the {{article.article.magazine.pretty_date}} issue of {{article.article.magazine.pubName}}. Subscribe

(Image credit: AFP via @daylife)

When Islamic Arabs murdered Americans on U.S. soil abroad, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya, while invading and torching U.S. embassies (in Egypt, Libya, Pakistan, Tunisia) on the eleventh anniversary of 9/11 (and since), the Obama administration initially denied the attacks had anything to do with 9/11 but instead attributed them to free expression in America, in the form of a crudely-made, months-old “film” on YouTube.com (“Innocence of Muslims”) which mocks Mohammad, the alleged “prophet” of Muslims. Prior to the 9/11 assaults the Obama administration failed to sufficiently arm Marines at its embassies, and since then it has failed to avenge the murders and vandalism, while also openly undermining the American commitment to free expression.

Let’s look at the most obvious examples of this. Just prior to the attacks of 9/11 this month, the U.S. embassy in Egypt issued the following apologetic statement – which has since been scrubbed from the site (I retrieved it on the morning of 9/11, at this location: http://egypt.usembassy.gov/pr091112.html):

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims – as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others.

The “misguided individuals” referred to in this statement were not the Muslim terrorists who were about to attack the U.S. embassy, but the makers of the video, “Innocence of Muslims.” Thus according to the Obama administration, which controls the policies and messages of U.S. embassies, Americans do not have the right to “hurt the feelings” of those they disagree with or even despise, especially if those we despise are “believers” among “all religions,” and even though religions, historically, have caused more misery, mayhem and murder in the world, second only to totalitarian states. The U.S. embassy message also condemns “enemies of democracy,” which means enemies of systems of mob rule and the tyrannical majority. You see, democracy is also viewed as a religion in today’s world, and is also advocated without evidence or regard for the fact that historically it too has led to national decay, destruction, and death (as America’s Framers knew).

I describe Mohammad is an “alleged” prophet because in fact there’s no evidence that any such fantasy as “god” (“Allah”) actually exists, so anyone purporting to be a “prophet” of some “god” is but a charlatan, a liar, a cheat. That’s true of Jesus and Moses too, who were also self-proclaimed “prophets” of their own personal “god.” They too were charlatans, and the billions of people over many centuries who’ve insisted that these three (or others) have been prophets of deities are ignorant dupes at best and knowing frauds at worst. Truly, god did not create man; man created god. Yet should people be free to be duped on this issue? Yes. Should they be free to be foolish in their faith? Sure. But they have no right to harm others – including those who state the plain truth, identify them as delusional, and despise them, whether in speeches, posters, cartoons, editorials, advertisements, books, television studios, movies, or silly internet videos.

Thankfully, there are still some governments and media outlets in the world that justly protect and foster free speech, especially when the speech rejects popularly-held myths, whether economic, political, or religious, but that’s not how the Obama administration prefers things to be. As the New York Times reported last May, Obama’s White House keeps a “kill list” that includes U.S. citizens abroad classified as enemies of state, and as the Wall Street Journal reported last July, the Obama campaign’s “truth team” has politically targeted an enemies list of those presumed guilty for being financial contributors to the Romney campaign.

The 9/11 apology by the U.S. embassy in Egypt was shameful. Its faint praise of Islam was an anti-Western appeasement. No honorable leader of the free world who truly loves the U.S. and it’s tradition of liberty would permit this. The shame was made still worse by Susan Rice, U.S. ambassador to the U.N., in commenting after the recent attacks, when more evidence was in. Rice denied that these were premeditated, coordinated terrorist assaults on U.S. soil and attributed them to free expression (the crude internet video). The Obama government then rounded up and arrested the maker of the anti-Mohammad video – on other (seemingly trumped up) complaints that had nothing to do with the video and which had been in abeyance for years. This was a disgusting act by the Obama regime, trying to show Muslims it would arrest and harass Americans who mock Mohammad – while the truly consistent Muslim leaders pledged to murder them.

In the liberal Slate magazine this week, a despicable essay notes that “the world doesn’t love the first amendment,” but instead of condemning that and extolling American principles, it refers to “the vile anti-Muslim video” and declares that “the U.S. overvalues free speech.” This is written by someone who counts on America still valuing free speech – else he wouldn’t be exercising his freedom at Slate – and who, instead of admiring America for that vestige of an age when liberty was more loved, ridicules it. He undervalues both free speech and rational argument. Instead of saying Muslims need to learn about reason, persuasion and free expression, this writer says it is Americans who must learn about (and empathize with) whatever is bothering Muslims and causing their rage to vandalize and murder. “Americans need to learn that the rest of the world—and not just Muslims—see no sense in the First Amendment,” he writes. “Even other Western nations take a more circumspect position on freedom of expression than we do,” he adds. “Free speech must yield to other values,” he declares, such as “the need for order.” Thus if any thug wants to shut you up, he need only foment “disorder” – threaten you, accost you, harm you – and that’s perfectly valid? If free expression is “sacred,” he says, it’s also religious – yet deserves less protection than does an actual religion.

In a similar vein see the public defacing of a pro-Israel poster appearing in the New York subway station at Times Square, which reads: “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man: Support Israel. Defeat Jihad.” Now watch a video of Egyptian radical Mona Eltahawy brazenly defacing the poster with spray paint, trying to cover it up, opposed by a courageous citizen wielding a video camera. Eltahawy claims “I am not violating free speech, I’m making an expression of my free speech. I’m expressing myself freely against hate and racism.” She then threatens to call the police, to stop the person who’s trying to stop her vandalism and her violation of the free speech of those who paid for the poster. The police arrive and arrest her and she declares that “as a U.S. citizen I have a right to know why I’m being arrested. This is what happens to non-violent protest in America.” She has a “right” she says, to violate the rights of others. It’s like the alleged “right” to health care, the “right” to violate the rights of health care providers and to force them to provide care, or force others to pay them to so provide. This is the common confusion about rights today – the alleged “right” to violate rights – a contradiction that few today even question, as they’ve also been told that reason and logic only express arbitrary, Western, patriarchal biases.

Even if the alleged American “liberals” would do nothing this week to defend our freedom to express secular views, perhaps the humanitarians at the U.N. would do so? World leaders converged on New York this week for the U.N.’s annual meetings, but did we observe any official, unified condemnation of the anti-U.S. violence abroad? No. At minimum, was there at least a robust defense of free speech? No. According to the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights (1948), freedom of expression means “the freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.” But what did we hear last week from Ban Ki-Moon, the U.N. Secretary General, in reaction to the recent anti-American violence? “All human beings have the inalienable right to freedom of expression,” he said, but added, “when some people use this freedom of expression to provoke and humiliate others’ values and beliefs, this cannot be protected.” Free expression excludes verbal or written “provocations” and “humiliations?” We have no right to condemn irrationality, charlatans, liars, murderers, self-immolators, homicide bombers, anti-Semites, racists, agrarian slavers, totalitarians, fascists? Ban Ki-Moon’s view is disgraceful, but fitting for one who heads a body whose members mostly deny human rights.